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Douglas

2009: In my 20’s.

Welcome! My given name is Douglas John Gill II. I was named after my father around the time I was born in February of 1981. I spent most of my childhood in rural area of northwest Ohio just west of Toledo, and some years in Indiana. I got fairly decent grades in high school, enjoying and excelling in subjects like History and Science. I spent a lot of time learning computer related skills during my teenage years. I enjoyed working with computers but was unsure of what I would eventually do for a living.

I began college in 1999 with no real focus, but taking various classes and working a bunch of odd jobs. I married my first wife in 2003 and we share 3 daughters.

It wasn’t until I joined the United States Army in 2005 that I had a focus, and a job good enough to provide for my family. I was trained as a line-of-sight (LOS) radio operator (25Q), part of the US Army signal corps. Though they are antiquated, these systems are still used for sending traffic from one local node to another, however they’re no longer primary transmission means. There are other more current systems being utilized for transmission such as direct fiber and geosynchronous satellite earth terminals (STT).

When I got to my unit (B Co. Sig Det 45th STB 45th SBDE) in Hawaii, I was assigned to a Joint Network Node (JNN) team. This Army system is a ‘server closet’ shelter filled with routers, switches, firewalls, call managers and encryption devices, that’s been mounted to the back of a HUMVEE. During the next three years, which included a 1 year deployment to Iraq followed by a 1 year deployment to Afghanistan, I became familiar with Cisco systems, networking (25F/25N) and a firmer understanding of satellite communications (25S).

Iraq ’06 – Acting up as usual.

After I stepped off of Active Duty and into inactive reserves I began working as a contractor for U.S. Army CECOM at Fort Hood Texas. I was hired as an instructor for the systems I worked on while serving on AD. I taught basic networking using Cisco products, how to set up the equipment and how to troubleshoot any network problems. I also started to master theory of satellite communications and began training soldiers on these systems. I spent a year drilling with a reserve unit out of Fort Knox in 2012.

It was during this time with CECOM that I separated from my first wife. While living by myself I began to develop a relationship with a woman living across the street. Unbeknownst to me, this woman began to lead me to Christ. I did not grow up in a Christian home and I had many doubts about world religions. Additionally, I was angry with God for the bad things that happened in my life. Yet, I really wanted to get to know this woman, so I was curious about her life and her Christian beliefs. Eventually we began discussing my disbelief and through her words the Lord began to lift the veil. Something had clicked and I began to see things differently. I had the desire to learn more about God and the things He wanted to teach me. Since then I strive to know Christ and make Him known. Aunna and I married in 2012, we share three children.

I consider myself to be a Reformed Christian who believes that God created all things, and from Adam’s disobedience came the fall of mankind. All are cursed as a result of his disobedience (Original Sin), and born enemies of God. God the Father, having ordained all that has and shall come to pass, had begotten the means by which freedom from the curse and reconciliation could be obtained by way of sacrifice of a perfect offering, His son Jesus Christ. Jesus, both God and man, through His death redeemed us by taking our sin as His and His perfect righteousness in life imputed upon us, deeming us justified before God. Those who are His have had the inclination of the heart changed (rebirth) by the work of the Holy Spirit, resulting in saving faith and through cooperative venture become sanctified.

I have recently been accepted to Reformation Bible College, and Lord willing I’ll start when they launch their online program. After which I hope to attend seminary someday and see where the Lord leads me.

After three and a half years with CECOM my new wife and I decided that we needed to deploy to Afghanistan as a civilian to rid ourselves of our combined debt. I deployed to Afghanistan with Rockwell Collins as a Deployable Ku/Ka Band Earth Terminal operator. It was a difficult nine months of separation but we were able to rid ourselves of a lot of debt, and give ourselves a fresh start. At that point we had determined that finishing my college education would be the next best step for my career and we moved to Northern Virginia. Once in Virginia I joined the Virginia National Guard.

I spent a semester with George Mason University where I found it extremely difficult to attend classes, work and drill with the VA National Guard. I was also commuting nearly 5 hours a day between the three. It was a stressful time and I decided to return to the workforce full time. Since then I have worked as a contractor for the Air Force, UPS and full time back in uniform for the Virginia National Guard. During my time as a full time guardsmen, the federal mission that I was a part of was scrapped. So in light of that event, we decided to move to west Tennessee.

I found a great job in Memphis as a software developer. The company is called Sedgwick, a claims management firm, and I write/fix computer programs in database languages; OpenEdge Progress 4GL, and Oracle PL/SQL. The team I work on is a fast track software development team responsible for creating enhancements or integrating new customer feeds rapidly. The only downside is the long commute from Dyer (north of Jackson) to Memphis, and back.